Fresh lavender blossoms, rosemary, thyme and garlic deliver complex depth with a slight French accent to Grilled Lamb Chops with Lavender. Recipe below.
Cooking with lavender got me thinking about some of the strange things we humans put in our mouths. Whether out of desperation or sheer culinary curiosity, we’ve eaten just about everything, from grasshoppers to poisonous blowfish, stinging nettles and even Marmite. And while much has been comedically made of
how hungry the first person to eat a lobster must have been, I’m far more impressed that anyone ever decided that there might be something worth eating inside a sea urchin.
By comparison, cooking with lavender seems downright tame. But for being such a delicate looking little flower, lavender packs a culinary wallop. It’s best known for its use in sweet treats—most notably lavender shortbread cookies. Lavender also sometimes adds its floral taste and aroma to black, green and herbal teas. It makes its way into savory dishes too, most often as an ingredient in the French herbs and spice mixture, Herbes de Provence.
This French connection makes perfect sense, sort of. While many of the herbs, spices and aromatics we cook with come from far-flung exotic places, most culinary lavender comes from the south of France. Which is pretty exotic too, come to think of it. Interestingly, though, lavender doesn’t see much use in traditional French cuisine; according to Vacluse Tourism in Provence, the French use it primarily for scenting household linens and bath water.
For savory dishes, lavender works best as an ensemble player, part of a mix of herbs, spices and aromatics flavoring a dish, rather than going solo. Too much lavender can overpower a dish, giving it an unpleasantly soapy taste, so use a light hand with it. But just a little can add a wonderful slightly sweet, floral note. For these chops, I combine lavender with rosemary, thyme and garlic.
If you have fresh lavender growing in your garden, you can use almost all of it. The blossoms (pluck just the petals, not the base of the flowers) and leaves can be added (sparingly) to a variety of dishes. Even the surprisingly sturdy flower stems can be used to skewer fruits and vegetables for a quick grilling.
Dried lavender is available at most spice shops, including Chicago-based The Spice House. You’ll find dried lavender flower buds—and more recipes for cooking with lavender—on their website. As with all herbs, use about half the amount of dried lavender to substitute for fresh.
Grilled Lamb Chops with Lavender
Serves 2 (see Kitchen Notes)
1 tablespoon fresh chopped rosemary (or 1 tablespoon dried)
1 teaspoon fresh chopped thyme (or 1/2 teaspoon dried)
1 teaspoon fresh lavender blossoms (or 1/2 teaspoon dried)
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tablespoon olive oil, plus more for grill
4 loin lamb chops, 1-1/2 inch thick, about 1 pound total
salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
Marinate chops. Mix herbs, garlic and 1 tablespoon olive oil in a small bowl. Trim excess fat from lamb chops and rub chops on both sides with herb garlic marinade. Arrange chops in a single layer on a sheet of plastic wrap and wrap them tightly. Refrigerate for at least 4 hours and up to 1 day.
Grill chops. About 1/2 hour before grilling, remove chops from fridge to allow them to come to room temperature. Prepare the grill for direct grilling. Season chops generously with salt and pepper. Brush the grill grate with olive oil and grill chops for about 4 minutes on the first side, covering the grill for at least part of the time to enhance smoky flavor. Turn and grill for about 3 minutes on the second side for medium rare, again closing the cover. Transfer chops to platter, tent loosely with foil and let them rest for about 5 minutes. Serve.
Kitchen Notes
How many servings? These four loin lamb chops weighed in at about 1/4 pound each. Given that they each had a sizable piece of bone in them, I expected to get just two servings from the four chops. The meaty, smoky richness made just a single chop an ample serving, though, and we were able to get a second meal from this recipe.
mmm… just reading the list of ingredients put me into a sunny herb garden, the scents of the thyme, rosemary & lavender rising in the hot dry air… thanks for the mental vacation!
You’re welcome, Eeka! Chopping those herbs in the kitchen can really send you on a mental vacation.
Very funny. Never thought of sea urchin in that context, but yes indeed. Every time I eat an artichoke I wonder who thought to scrape the inside of the leaves with the teeth and work through the rest of the mess to get to the tiny heart.
Now that you mention artichokes, Altadenahiker, maybe there’s some part of our ancestral brains that thought if something is working that hard to protect its insides, those insides must taste pretty good.
We raise lambs & grow lavender, so this seems a perfect post for us. Funny you should mention sea urchin, as my husband has been known to pick up sea urchins on our beach explorations and eat the sea urchin roe (eggs) raw….he is the gourmet in the family. He would have been one of those people eating things the rest of us were scared to eat, or never even considered eating. Love this post.
A delicious recipe for lamb and nice to learn about using lavender. The marinade sounds so good and gets these chops ready to grill, Yum!
mmm looks tasty. Always looking for new recipes, thanks for sharing.
Simon